Born in Istanbul in 1973, Eser Turan attended Uskudar American Academy in Istanbul and received her bachelor's degree in Architecture at Istanbul Technical University.

In 1996, she was accepted to the master's program at University of California at Berkeley and received a teaching scholarship for her two years of study. 

Her master's thesis "Thinking Design Thinking" (1998) was a pioneering study in the field of Conceptual Design, infusing key principles of philosophy, psychology and phenomenology to create a method to design concepts for architectural projects. Her innovative method later received wide recognition in the field of Brand Design. 

She taught design classes at UC Berkeley and after graduation worked at top architecture and interiors firms such as HOK and IA during the Silicon Valley boom. She coordinated the office team and supervised jobsites of 100+ million dollar projects of leading global tech companies such as Nortel and Symantec for a period of six years.

In the post-9/11 period in the US, the heightened suspicion of non-Americans propelled her to define the cross-cultural identity of Turkish-Americans in a cultural magazine. With that decision, she started publishing Turkuaz Magazine and utilized her expertise in conceptual design to promote Turkish-American community, culture and businesses in the US. 

Turkuaz Magazine, published in 2002 garnered a record readership within its first year. By 2004 Turkuaz became the first and only Turkish-American publication to be accepted for nationwide distribution in the US and was sold in 33 states at 130 prestigious bookstores. 

Essentially not a political publication, various hot topics in Turkish-American international relations caused Turkuaz Magazine to be placed in the 'current events' section of Barnes & Noble and Borders bookstores, right next to Time and Newsweek, which garnered it an average sale record of 70%.

In order to publish Turkuaz Magazine, Eser Turan started her media company, Turkuaz Productions, LLC. in the US, offering media services for Turkish-American artists, cultural events and businesses. 

By 2006, the marketing needs of the magazine and newsportal prompted her to start her branding company in Turkey, under the name of Ajans 869, a niche design agency serving the branding needs of Turks and Turkey worldwide. 

As of 2017, Turkuaz is published online, in the form of a video-magazine, as a free digital publication, catering to the needs of the Turkish Expats worldwide. 

By 2018, the growing number of Turkish Expats fighting "agent & terrorist" defamation cases in Turkey - the most famous one being the international crisis caused by the one-year imprisonment of her partner Deniz Yücel without a single indictment - motivated her to put a name to this invisible population of 6 million expats to better defend their rights and organize campaigns via social media under an all-encompassing title, Turkuaz Republic.

In 2019, she launched Turkuaz Store and Turkuaz Directory as key components of Turkuaz Republic.